Nature Moncton Nature
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With the
mating season for coyotes, red fox, and bobcat just
around the
corner, Brian Coyle shares a couple of videos of
a red fox
and then a bobcat scent-marking on a granite
glacial
erratic. The red fox had scent-marked the night
before, and
this held the interest of the bobcat the next day,
and the
bobcat leaves a scent mark of its own.
(Editor’s
note: click on the links below to see the boys leaving their calling card to mark their territory, letting other males know the area is taken
and letting potential mates know they are available!)
40712076_903617493801945_784094963678973418_n_x264.mp4
120642726_1074199639671589_2138374974642550667_n_x264.mp4
**Not many
insects are to be seen in January, but Louise Nichols photographed a paper
wasp that appeared on their Aulac front porch in the mild temperatures and
rain of Thursday. The wasp was alive, but just barely.
**Jane
LeBlanc hasn't seen as many red-breasted nuthatches around this winter
as she normally does, but one arrived on Friday for a photo-op.
**On the
warm, wet day of Thursday, Shannon Inman noted that a cankered area of the bark
of several trees was exuding a mass of bubbles. When she went back the
next day, she found the mass of bubbles had reduced in size and had fallen to the
base of the trees.
An odd
scenario, and any potential explanation would be appreciated.
Shannon also
took note of an orange jelly mushroom looking quite prime for
mid-January!
**Brian
Stone walked the Tankville School trail on Wednesday and didn't find much to
take pictures of, but he photographed a male downy woodpecker, a robin's
nest tilted over that offered a view of its inner space, a tree with its
bark stripped off from probable porcupine activity, a long strip of mushrooms
growing on a tree trunk, and a woodpecker hole that was full of
seeds most likely put there by a trail walker who was feeding birds along the
way. Several other woodpecker holes had received the same treatment.
(Editor’s
note: note in Brian’s mushroom photo that the mushrooms are all growing in
the furrows of the mature bark to be able to reach the inside tissues to
perform their recycling efforts. It is a polypore species, but the winter
conditions have altered their appearance to make identification challenging.)
Nelson
Poirier
Nature Moncton
